Well, with gold at an all-time high of $952, platinum skyrocketing and soybeans at record levels, you can say that $100 oil either shows how big the petroleum imbalance is or you can say it's just the dollar hitting new lows. Given that oil is priced in dollars, it's tempting to conclude that this is just more fallout from the Bernanke-led death of the dollar, but I think it goes deeper than that. With the Tata Motors unleashing their $2,500 Nano car on India's 700 million would-be drivers, it's hard to imagine that the demand for petroleum products is going to go down much, even in a real U.S. recession.

We will see regular unleaded prices in the $3.50 to $3.75 range in April and May, and $4 in the San Francisco Bay Area. That should set off another round of stock price escalation in the alternative energy sector.